United Nations (UN) humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths has warned that at least $1 billion, roughly the same amount in euros, will be needed to avert famine deaths in Somalia by early 2023.
From Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, Martin Griffiths made a instructions to the press, where he said that, according to a new report by a panel of independent experts, famine will hit the country between october and december.
The situation could worsen in 2023, when two more dry seasons are expected to aggravate the historic drought that is hitting the Horn of Africa country, Griffiths said in the balance of his five-day trip to Somalia.
According to the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, more than $1 billion in new funding is needed, on top of the roughly $1.4 billion the organization had already requested.
The appeal was successful, Griffiths said, thanks to the US Agency for International Development (USAID), which announced a $476 million grant in humanitarian and development assistance in July.
The USAID-created Famine Early Warning Systems Network said in a report released Monday that famine is expected to emerge later this year in three areas of the Bay Area (southeast), including Baidoa and Burhakaba.
Near 7.1 million people need urgent assistance to treat and prevent acute malnutrition in Somalia and reduce the number of deaths related to hunger, according to a recent analysis by the organization.
At least 730 children have died of malnutrition in Somalia since Januaryand the figures could increase in the coming months, when the center and south of the country enter a situation of hunger, warned the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
“One and a half million children, almost half of all children under 5 years of age, may suffer from acute malnutrition, and of these 385,000 will need help,” warned the head of UNICEF in Somalia, Wafaa Saeed, stressing that “the numbers are unprecedented.
The UNICEF official warned that in this East African country, which borders Kenya, Ethiopia and Djibouti, 4.5 million people urgently need waterat a time when the prices of this basic good have increased between 55 and 85% since the beginning of the year.
There has also been a rise in outbreaks of cholera, measles and acute diarrhoea, all triggered by the food crisis and lack of water, the country’s Unicef leader said, arguing that the international community must help.
The lack of rain is the latest problem facing the country, after having endured decades of conflict, massive population displacements and, more recently, the sharp rise in the prices of cereals and other basic foods, partly due to the war. . in Ukraine.
Quoted by the Efe agency, Saeed added that Somalia is suffering the third drought in just a decade, after 260,000 people died in 2011, most of them children, and the current one, with four consecutive seasons without rain, could be even worse. , according to the UN.
Source: Observadora
